According to the American Psychological Association, parenting practices around the world share three major goals: ensuring children’s health and safety, preparing children for life as productive adults, and transmitting cultural values (APA, 2018). Needless to say, these objectives are very crucial for a child’s overall wellbeing. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has upended family life around the world. The endless uncertainty has a lot to navigate for anyone, but especially for parents and the adolescent children.
To promote the healthy parent-child relationship, the Counseling Unit of Brac University hosted two distinct workshops with the parents of the students’ of Brac University on 18 and 19 June 2021 from 04:30pm-06:30pm. The workshops were on “Interpersonal Relationship of Parents: Its Impact on Child' Mental Health”, and “Self-Care” respectively. The aims of the session on Interpersonal Relationship of Parents: Its Impact on Child' Mental Health were to explore the impacts of family relationships on a child's mental well-being, identify the barriers of effective communication, and finally apply some healthy ways through which the parents can enhance the quality of the interpersonal relationship and communication skills.
The second session, which was on Self Care, was based on the notion that parents need self-care during this pandemic, as their mental wellness can have significant positive influences on their adolescent child’s mental, cognitive, social, and intellectual aspects. In the session, the counselors discussed the importance of self-care, internal barriers for not doing self-care, and impacts of self-care. In the end, some effective ways to promote self-care were shared.
Total ten counselors from the Counseling Unit, coordinated by Ms. Ayesha Seddiqa, designed and conducted these two sessions in three different groups. Altogether, around 300 parents joined the sessions. As the sessions progressed, the parents shared their challenges during this pandemic. From their valuable sharing, it was apparent that they had insightful thoughts about their pattern of communication, and how they can think, feel, and act differently. At the end of each session, many parents expressed their need to join such workshops in the future. They appreciated the effort of Brac University to address parent’s mental health issues. In addition, they also shared that the sessions were beneficial for personal growth and showed interest to be connected with the team of the Counseling Unit for their child’s wellbeing.
Overall, the sessions were supervised by the Advisor of the Counseling Unit, Professor Mehtab Khanam, the Executive Secretary of Student Life, Brac University Mr. Saif Hossain and the Coordinator of Counseling Unit Mr. Shami Suhrid.